Personality

Mulan, aberrant and unlike most previous female roles, is courageous and more self-reliant. She also does not fit in with the expectations of a young Chinese girl of the time; despite her natural beauty, she is clumsy, outspoken, and independent rather than graceful, obedient, silent and demure. Which is why her meeting with the matchmaker ended in chaos, that and help from a certain lucky cricket, and why the matchmaker claimed that even though she has the looks of a bride, it will never work because all she will do is dishonor her parents and her future husband. However, her courage, intelligence, and determination helped her through her adventures of defeating the Hun Army. She is also kind and warm-hearted despite her clumsiness.

Skills

Although Mulan possesses no magical or superhuman powers, she has military training courtesy of Shang.

Martial Arts: As part of her training, Mulan learned kung fu, eventually becoming proficient in hand-to-hand fighting.

Swordsmanship: Mulan honed her skill with her father's sword and became an expert swordswoman, easily holding her own against even the battle-hardened Shan Yu.

Marksmanship: Under Shang's tutelage, Mulan developed skill with ranged weaponry, from the bow and arrow to gunpowder cannons.

Horseback riding: Even before her time in the army, Mulan is an excellent equestrian, further enhanced by her bond with loyal steed Khan.

Strategist: Mulan is also intelligent, cunning and resourceful. Knowing her unit was vastly outnumbered, she was able to quickly think of using the last cannon to cause an avalanche on the entire Hun army, quite literally stopping them cold, and later lure Shan Yu into Mushu's firing range. When she pulled out her fan, she acted as though she was in shock from having nothing left to fight with, when all along she planned to disarm him with it.

Appearance

Mulan is a 16-year old tomboy of Chinese origin. She is a natural beauty, with dark brown eyes and straight, black hair. However, her hair length changes. In the beginning of the original film, her hair was long and went down to her waist. Later in the film, when she leaves to join the army, she cuts her hair with her father's sword and ties it up in a bun, which helps her blend into the army so that the other soldiers don't know that she's really a woman. In the second film, her hair was grown, not to its original length, but it's noticeably longer than before. In promotional works, her hair is always shown as its original length, down to the waist.

Other Outfits

Mulan's face was elongated very slightly and is no longer as rounded as it used to be. The epicanthic folds by her eyes have also been sharpened a bit to give them a more narrow appearance. Her body type was also changed to a more hour glass shape from her original androgynous figure in the film. Mulan wears an elaborate, bejeweled gold hair clip and her now waist-length hair is long and flowing. The material used in her Hanfu dress is metallic-looking in appearance and texture and still sports the same color from her old appearance. In early redesigns, her dress is more reddish with sparkles, much of her black hair is loose and down instead of having the hair clip. Her face and the other visible parts of her skin appear to be whitened with powder, with her cheeks touched with rouge and her lips painted red; somewhat resembling a more traditional Chinese bride. Other early redesigns included her dress being bright gold and dark red instead of green, blue and yellow.